Written by

Brendan Bures

Sports Editor @BrenBures

You’re Jimbo Fisher and you’ve just suffered one of the worst losses of your Florida State head coaching career against NC State. Clamors of “FSU-is-back,” and Heisman races, and National Championship hopes are silenced in one fell swoop. Not only did you lose, you were outcoached; your more talented players were outperformed by kids from North Carolina, a recruiting coolbed.

You know you must choose your next words carefully, people are listening to hear what a leader says to lift the spirits of crushed hope. They need words of encouragement, a reason to believe that things don’t appear quite as bad as they are. What exactly could you say?

“We still control our own destiny in the ACC,” Fisher said following the loss.

Let’s review: Not only was this team predicted to compete for a BCS bowl, they were favored as a National Championship contender. Winning the ACC had become a foregone conclusion. And Fisher thought that, too. Sure, he’d wax pleasant about upcoming teams saying “they’ve got some guys who can play” and “we’re taking this season one game at a time,” but even Fisher didn’t pretend like this team had one goal this season other than winning the National Championship, or at least seriously competing for it.

This is Tallahassee. This is Florida State. Our Seminoles are supposed to be top contenders, not laughable losers.

“We all know where we want to go,” Fisher said at the Alumni Kickoff Luncheon before the season. “We sit up here and everybody says, ‘well he’s talking big.’ Every team in America wants to be No. 1. Everybody sets out with the same goal every year.”

That goal: winning. When the coach himself sets that high of an expectation for the year, anything short of that will be considered failure. Whether the season should be classified that way will be debated by how the team responds moving forward, but right now, indisputably, it feels like failure. The undeniable hope and “special” quality the team exuded this year, that maybe we could actually be “back” following a victory over Clemson, has all vanished like a fart in the wind.

When EJ Manuel’s Hail Mary attempt was swatted down like an annoying fly who simply didn’t belong, I walked around my apartment complex, hoping to wallow with others. Misery loves company after all. And I overheard one fan reaming Jimbo Fisher, fed up with the torture of crushed dreams after losing yearly to unranked and unqualified opponents. He wished Florida State would collapse—lose and lose and lose—all to justify firing Fisher at the end of the season.

Add that to reports of riots breaking out in the Indian Village apartment complex, and it seems like Jimbo Fisher has lost at least part of the FSU fan base.

Since 2005, FSU has lost eight of its last nine games as a ranked team against road underdogs. Of course some of those losses fall on Bobby Bowden’s shoulders, but Florida State—and this is especially true in the Jimbo Fisher era—can’t execute on the road.

Florida State has always had all the resources (except maybe an Indoor Practice Facility; which, I guess blame that?), talent and ability to win, but completing the puzzle has eluded this team for too long.

It’s almost like they’re assembling a 100,000-piece jigsaw puzzle of a blue sky. Each time the Seminoles should win, when the impending victory seems like an afterthought, that’s when FSU has the most difficulties. The ’Noles are no road warriors, they are road peasants.

Consider key losses on the road for Florida State in the past three years: Thursday night road loss in 2010 vs. NC State, the infamous 2011 loss against Wake Forest and now this. And each time Florida State failed to execute. Plays that should be routine like a punt, are walking calamities waiting to stumble into a disaster for Florida State.

When the punt was blocked, the NC State defender zipped through the same hole a USF defender did last week: in between Demonte McAllister and Kevin Haplea on the wedge in front of punter Cason Beatty. Fisher knew it was a problem from the last game and didn’t fix it. No football team should have punts blocked in back-to-back weeks, but it didn’t seem out of the ordinary during the Fisher era.

Florida State revealed its true character on the 3rd and 9 play with 2:38 remaining in the game. With the threat of giving the ball back to NC State on the line and ending all expectations for the season, Fisher elected to run the ball to waste the Wolfpack’s last time out.

They weren’t playing to win, they played not to lose.

The fact that Fisher didn’t trust his fifth-year QB EJ Manuel to throw the ball to pick up the first down tells me all I need to know about how Fisher and the staff really feels about Manuel. This year, both Fisher and Manuel say their relationship had developed and improved. Fisher trusted and listened to EJ Manuel’s input calling plays now.

“It’s ‘what are you comfortable with? what do you like? what do you feel here or there?’ and we’ll discuss,” Fisher said before this year’s Wake Forest game. “And I give him a lot more freedom with what we do.”

Trust in a relationship reveals itself most when situations are at their worst. It’s easy to trust and believe when the team is winning, Manuel being touted as “show dog” for the Heisman and columns of “FSU-is-back” are pouring in. When outlooks appear most bleak, however, is when people show how they really feel about each other. When the chips were down, Fisher couldn't loosen his control and trust the most efficient quarterback in ACC history to throw the ball.

That's part of Fisher's problem, though: his need for control. And moving forward, that will be the question. Can Fisher trust Manuel and the offense to play like they did against Clemson and call the game as such, or is he going to continue to play it safe like he did against USF and NC State?

We'll see, but they can't repeat what happened when they lost last year--fold under the pressure. The team felt different this year and this week theycan tell people they’ll bounce back, that things will change, but their response on the field will say everything you need to know. And recent history has shown the Seminole Way: when it rains, it pours.At least they can control their destiny in the ACC.